The Dire Earth: A Novella (The Dire Earth Cycle)

by Jason M. Hough

  Nigel grunted. “When I’m ready.” To his own ear he sounded like some drugged-up washout after an all-nighter. He tried to look at the person in front of him and winced in the glare of a flashlight.

  “Does he have the rash?” someone asked. A different voice.

  “Negative,” a third said.

  The first man spoke again, his voice nasal and thin, like a weasel in human form. “The woman claims you possess knowledge regarding Nightcliff’s safe. True?”

  Nigel swallowed. They spoke like police officers, not street thugs. “Who … Who’s asking?”

  “A representative of Nightcliff.”

  With an effort Nigel rubbed his eyes with his free hand. The room swam into focus. A man leaned over the table in front of him. He had long stringy hair and the kind of eyes that would frighten children. He wore a gray overcoat. The two men standing behind him wore army uniforms, and had compact machine guns drawn and ready. Nigel cleared his throat. “Where is she?”

  Weasel-man ignored the question. “Are you capable of entering that safe or not?”

  “Not with a gun in my face. Where’s Rebecca?”

  “Indisposed.”

  “Dead?”

  The man glanced about the room. “She said you ran some kind of empire from here.”

  “She said that? I …” Nigel stopped himself. Possibilities unfolded in his mind. Intending to or not, heard correctly or not, Rebecca had nevertheless given him a gift. This was a new world, and he could make his own identity in it. Willing calm, Nigel spoke carefully. “I’m renovating. Who are you?”

  For a moment the man just sat there, sizing Nigel up, as if deciding how much patience he should expend here. “Kip Osmak. Assistant to Chief Constable Arthur Braithwaite, acting commander of Nightcliff.”

  Nigel leaned forward in the chair, the squeak of his leather duster on the cushion masking the sound of the rattling chain. He glanced upward, groping for clear thoughts, and saw a small black dome attached to the ceiling just inside the door. Security camera. Dead or disconnected most likely, but that wouldn’t be common knowledge. “Get all that, Verna?” he said to the dome. Verna? Sorry, Mum. First name that came to mind.

  Kip turned and followed Nigel’s gaze. His friends did the same. Unobserved, Nigel probed around on the floor by his feet until he found the box that contained his implements. He opened it and began to run his fingers across the tiny tools.

  The weasel turned back, his façade of confidence drained away.

  “Tell me something,” Nigel said. Below the table he slid what he hoped was the right tool from its sleeve, resting the case between his legs. “Since when is the army enforcing law in Darwin, anyway?”

  Kip licked his lips, tongue darting like a lizard’s. “Destroy that camera,” he said. One of the soldiers obeyed. He bashed the security camera three times, each swing more zealous than the last. The second blow cracked the glass shell, the third shattered it.

  As shards rained down Nigel let the chain fall from his wrist and slipped the lock pick into his sleeve.

  Kip turned back, dropping the cane on the desk with a dull thud. “Would one of you please guard the entrance? And the other, search the other floors for this Verna and anyone else? Blackfield was specific. No witnesses.”

  The two men turned in unison and departed.

  “They won’t find anything,” Nigel said. “Verna is in Dublin, Ireland. That’s a remote feed. Can’t be too cautious.”

  Understanding grew across Kip’s face. “Ah, I see. You’ve been down here all along. You think there’s still a world beyond Darwin. Do you have any idea what’s going on out there?” He gestured broadly.

  “A flu or something.”

  Kip shook his head. “It’s not that simple.” He rattled off a story so bizarre Nigel thought it could be nothing other than true. Darwin had become a safe haven against an otherwise all-consuming disease. Billions dead. Billions. Millions surviving as some kind of murderous shadow of their former selves. And then there was Darwin, or at least the portion of it closest to the Elevator. The last safe place. An island surrounded by toxic air, under constant assault from the murderous hordes who bore crimson rashes on their necks. An island, Nigel realized, that no cargo ship would ever reach. A new world indeed …

  The ramifications flooded into his mind faster than he could grasp them. How long would the situation last? What would people eat? Who would maintain law and order?

  He glanced at the man across from him with fresh eyes. The army, in charge of Nightcliff.

  Suddenly everything that had happened in the last few days made sense. At least he could see a possible explanation. Novak had sent Nigel to Darwin knowing what happened after wouldn’t matter. Rebecca, desperate, had sought a new buyer for Nigel’s extraordinary knowledge of Nightcliff’s vault. Whoever had wanted inside before didn’t matter. Outside this garage a great reshuffling was going on, the smart people grabbing what power and resources they could before the dust settled. Rumble on the pitch. “Nightcliff Secure Storage,” he said carefully.

  Kip nodded. “Nightcliff Secure Storage. My boss needs access, and Neil Platz cannot make the trip down just now.”

  “If I help, I’m guessing your boss might not want me walking around afterwards?”

  The man across the table gave the slightest of nods.

  “And if I refuse, same thing?”

  Again a nod. “Those were my orders.”

  “What do you do in Nightcliff?” Nigel asked.

  “Traffic control. Elevator logistics.”

  “Hmm. That’s interesting.”

  A hint of surprise flashed across Kip’s face, as if this were the first time anyone found his work interesting. “Is it?”

  “Absolutely. Look, this city,” Nigel said, his thoughts only a short distance ahead of his mouth, “is a powder keg. A time bomb. There’s a million people here, not to mention whoever slipped in before the disease hit. I assume some did?”

  “Plenty. An avalanche. Please, make your point, I’m due back—”

  Nigel held up his hands. “Think about it. Just for a moment. The city is cut off from the world, yes?”

  “Yes,” he said carefully. “For now.”

  “What will people eat and drink?”

  “Whatever they have?”

  Nigel shook his head. “That will only last a week, perhaps two.”

  Kip pondered that for a moment. “Maybe that’ll be enough.”

  Nigel gave a shrug. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. Suppose for a second this scenario will go on indefinitely.”

  The other man’s brow furrowed. His eyes darted back and forth. For a brief instant he looked like a child who’d just been told that maybe, just maybe, there is no Santa Claus.

  “Look,” Nigel said. “I’ll open the safe for you, no problem. In exchange, you let me live. Given your role in Nightcliff, you’ll know what’s needed. You’ll hear things. I’m a man who can find things and move them. We’d make a great team.” Nigel could see his little house of cards growing with every lie he spewed, but if it could buy him a few days to sort things out …

  The look in Kip’s face, though, was priceless. A kid who’d just learned how to perform a magic trick. He was nodding, his beady little weasel eyes suddenly bright and alive. “So … you use your connections in the underworld—”

  Don’t have any. A minor inconvenient detail.

  “—and I use my inside position in Nightcliff.”

  “Exactly,” Nigel said.

  After a few seconds Kip said, “Clever.”

  Nigel grinned, and tapped his temple with his index finger. “See? People like us, we need to carve out a new role for ourselves. Make ourselves valuable. So, do we have a deal?”

  The weasel of a man extended his hand. “What’s your name, anyway?”

  “Pr—” Nigel started to say Proctor, Nigel Proctor. But it struck him that his ties to Novak & Sons might be found somehow. Not to mention his total lack of connections t
o Darwin’s underworld. Besides, Nigel Proctor was not the name of a crime lord. At that moment the news screen from the bar in Sydney popped into his head. RUMBLE ON THE PITCH, the headline had been. “Rumble,” he said.

  “Prumble?”

  Sure, why not. “That’s me.”

  “First name?”

  “No.”

  Kip slowly rose to his feet. “Well, then, Mr. Prumble. It’s time I took you to Nightcliff.”

  _

  An hour later, after a harrowing journey through the chaos of Darwin’s streets in the back of an armored personnel carrier, Nigel found himself kneeling before the Kastensauer Mark 8 locking mechanism of Nightcliff’s vault door.

  The room itself was exactly as he remembered it. White tile floor, bare white walls, white-paneled ceiling lined with rows of white LEDs. Sterile as they come. Meant to instill confidence in those who needed to store their belongings here before making an extended trip to the space stations high above. Virtually every megabillionaire in the world had probably stepped through this gigantic door at some point in the last few years, Neil Platz at their side, as they stowed a one-of-a-kind watch or a sensitive datacube for safekeeping while they made their pilgrimage up to see the remnant of the Builders’ vessel at Anchor.

  Echoing footfalls in the long hallway behind coaxed Nigel out of his semi-trance. It sounded like an entire brigade approached, their boots slapping against the marble tiles like hammer blows.

  “Look,” he said to Kip, who stood lamely in the corner, “call me Nigel in front of these people, all right? I’d prefer my, uh, reputation, not precede me.”

  “Fine,” Kip hissed.

  At the door all but one of the pairs of boots stopped. Two people entered.

  “Is this him?” a gravelly voice asked.

  “Yes, Chief Constable,” Kip stammered. “His name is Nigel.”

  Prumble remained facing the lock, pretending to be busy with it. He cast a quick vague glance over his shoulder and saw a gaunt elderly man in a police uniform. The man next to him wore army fatigues, and was powerfully built. Not muscular per se, just … hard. Chiseled, the ladies might say. His jaw, his eyes, everything about him said “fuck you.”

  “G’day,” Prumble said. When in Rome, he figured.

  “Hello,” Braithwaite said. “This is Lieutenant Blackfield, in charge of ground security.”

  “Tough times ahead for you, eh, mate?” Blackfield asked.

  “How do you mean?”

  “Maintaining that belly in our little tomb of a city is going to be rough, I wager.”

  “Hmm,” Prumble said. He’d learned over the years that individuals who sought to goad him with comments about his weight were individuals of microscopically small intellect. On any other day he would have devastated the asshole in the way only words can. “I can be resourceful,” he replied, instead.

  “That’s quite enough Mr. Blackfield,” Braithwaite said. “Let’s talk about the vault.”

  “Indeed. I assume you’d like to select a new code?”

  “Quite,” the old man said. “Mr. Platz has asked me to look after affairs here for now, hence the need.”

  “None of my business, really,” Prumble said.

  He set about fiddling with the lock, leaning over it to see the digital readout of numbers on a hooded display at the top. He dialed in the installer’s code he’d set up years earlier. The wheel spun smoothly under his hand, resisting slightly as the mechanism within used this rotation to generate the electricity needed to operate. It made it difficult to dial the wheel quickly, but Prumble, being used to this sort of thing, still managed to select the proper six-digit sequence on his first try. The dial itself, which was free of any visible numbering, betrayed nothing. Only the digital readout on top indicated what number he’d selected, and whenever he stopped and started turning in the other direction, the display began at a random number. So even memorizing how far he turned the dial each time would not help someone trying to sleuth out the code.

  The mechanism made a soft chirp as the installer’s code was verified. Prumble let out a long breath and dialed through the maintenance options. “Right,” Prumble said. “Use the little screen here and pick your combination. Four numbers between one and a hundred. Your fingertips will be scanned by the dial itself and combined with the code. Your retina will be scanned by a camera behind the readout panel. It will truly be a code that works only for you.”

  “Why even have the code?”

  Prumble shrugged. “The code can be discovered. Your fingerprints can be obtained and replicated, as can your retina. All three combined, however …” Again he shrugged, then moved aside as Braithwaite leaned over the dial and began the process. Prumble had been in this very place, three years earlier. An administrator had escorted him then, and he’d been forced to leave the room and wait in a janitor’s closet nearby whenever Neil Platz himself had to come in and do this part of the keying. Neil had demanded this conceit, a perfectly normal request when configuring vaults for the rich and powerful.

  After ten seconds or so Braithwaite moved away. “Is that it then?”

  “That’s it. The vault is keyed to you.”

  “Excellent. Now if you don’t mind …” To Prumble’s surprise, instead of leaving, Braithwaite dialed in his code and opened the vault door. He stepped inside, alone. Seconds passed in total silence before the man emerged again, a datacube in one hand. He snapped his fingers and a guard came forward, holding out an open aluminum case. Braithwaite slipped the cube into a foam support, then took the offered case from the man. “Thank you, everyone. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a climber to catch.”

  “Enjoy the ride,” Prumble said amicably.

  Braithwaite nodded, then cast a second awkward nod at the silent form of Kip Osmak, who stood in the corner of the room, fidgeting. “Kip will see you safely back to … well, wherever.” Then Braithwaite left, plunging the room into a sudden, uncomfortable silence. Blackfield remained.

  “Am I free to go?” Prumble asked the soldier.

  Blackfield held up a finger and waited until the sound of Braithwaite’s footfalls faded to nothing. “Not exactly. I’ve got a bit more in mind.”

  The man laid out his plan. The real reason Kip had sought out Prumble. A pretty simple ruse, but then the best are, aren’t they? He wanted the lock rekeyed for Nightcliff’s new commander, as was now done, but he also wanted the maintenance access Prumble had just demonstrated for himself, to use “in an emergency.”

  “What’s in it for me?” Prumble asked.

  “Your continued existence on this Earth,” Blackfield shot back. “I can’t exactly let you leave here knowing you can break into our vault.”

  “That’s a good start,” Prumble said. It took a force of will to keep the anxiety from his voice.

  “Okay, fine. And a willingness on my part, and my boys, to pretend we don’t know what sort of work you did before the shit went down. Kip here tells me you had quite the operation going.”

  “He mentioned that, did he?” Prumble suddenly doubted the wisdom of his chosen persona. Seemed like a good idea at the time. Famous last words if there ever were any.

  Blackfield waved the comment away. “The slate’s wiped clean, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Well … I’ll need some special equipment to pull off what you’re asking for,” Prumble said truthfully. Mostly. There was another reason, one he’d only just thought of, but this oily bastard didn’t need to know that.

  “Special equipment? What the fuck for?”

  “Only the ‘owner’s code,’ which I’ve just configured for Mr. Braithwaite, can be reset without extra gear. To set or reset the maintenance code—what you’re asking for—one needs a special transponder box plugged into a recessed port inside the vault itself.” And then I can reset the master code for myself. Everybody wins.

  “You have this box?”

  Prumble thought about answering truthfully, then about lying and saying yes.
He settled on the in-between option. “I can acquire one.”

  “Do it,” Blackfield said. “Kip, make the arrangements. I want this handled ASAFP.”

  Kip squirmed in the corner. “Okay. I mean, yes, sir.”

  Blackfield fixed a nasty stare on the thin man, then spun on his heel and walked out, army boots smacking against the white-tiled floor. His soldiers fell in behind him, obedient as dogs.

  A silence stretched to fill the space left by the lieutenant. Prumble glanced at Kip, and found the stringy-haired, dour son of a bitch looking directly back.

  “You can actually get this thing, right?” Kip asked.

  Prumble shrugged. “Depends. Know anyone who can leave the city?”

  Part Four

  Distance of Hope

  Chapter One

  DARWIN, AUSTRALIA

  20.APR.2278

  She sped down the center of the road on a stolen motorcycle. The tach read 100 kph. The wind in her hair felt like a blast furnace. Mounted on the back of the bike, an ancient portable stereo blared Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust.”

  Sam muttered with the lyrics, leaning the bike into a quick weave around the loping form of something previously human. She shot the creature from only three meters away, a shotgun blast that shredded through the animal’s filthy clothes.

  Behind her a few dozen of the beasts bellowed anger and grief at the action. They surged, unable to comprehend the fact that they’d never quite catch her. The bike’s electric motor churned out its low whine and would continue to do so for days.

  The street, bisecting a suburb of Darwin just east of Lyons, was littered with abandoned cars and the bodies of those who fell when the ailment hit. The corpses had shocked her at first. Filled her first with rage and then later a sadness unlike any she’d ever known. So many dead. Everyone she’d ever met.

  Now the bodies were just scenery. Not worth thinking about. The formerly human that survived the infection were the only things worth sparing a thought for.

  And that thought was Kill.

  Whatever reservations she’d held back at the lodge about killing the infected died in East Palmerston. Their numbers were staggering, and Sam, lacking the burden of familiarity with any of them, found her remorse dissolve with each pull of the trigger, each swing of the ax, each windpipe crushed by her own two hands. She’d left a sea of corpses behind, and felt no remorse. She’d done them a favor, as far as she was concerned.